Petition To Restrict Ala State School Board and State Superintendent of Education From Regulating Christian Schools and Home Schools

Petition to allow Alabama Citizens to maintain Local and Parental Control of Education And To Prevent The Over Powering Reach of State School Board

Proposal by Dr. Tommy Bice of the Alabama State School Board in July 2013 To Control, Regulate and Tax Christian Schools and Home Schools

In early June the Alabama State Department of Education (ALSDE) notified church and private schools of their intentions to propose to the Alabama State Board of Education certain amendments to the Alabama Administrative Code (AAC) to tighten its control and regulation over private and church schools. While this proposal is on hold, but has the potential to be activated. The
Alabama State Department of Education has yet to resend this policy and
the President of the Alabama State School Board has continued to actively promote the controlling agenda of the Federal Common Core.

The below were requirements in a 49 page proposal by Dr. Tommy Bice to control and regulate Christian Schools and Home Schools:
1. A $500 fee or tax required from all Christian Schools or Home School groups to accompany an application.
2. Application must contain legal church documents to prove the legal status of the church school ministry
3. A catalog of courses taught

Consequences for Failure to comply would mean the following:
1. No diploma would be recognized from Christian School or Home Schools by the State of Alabama
2. Students from Christian Schools or Home School would not be able to transfer credits to a public school
3. Graduates would NOT be able to attend Alabama two or four year colleges

We petition the Alabama Legislature to pass a law to prohibit the Alabama State Superintendent and Alabama State School Board from regulating, controlling, or interfering with the establishment, curriculum or staff of Christian schools and home schools. It is further requested that Alabama State School Board be prohibited from taxing or charging fees to Christian schools and home schools. Full resolution is listed below. Alabama should be also be free from the federal control of education and the implementing education control program known as Common Core.

We the Citizens of Alabama Petition the Legislature to pass this legislation, SB38 Brewbaker Bill, to free Christian Schools and Home Schools from control, regulation, and taxation by the Alabama Dept of Education and School Board:

We, the undersigned citizens of Alabama, do hereby reaffirm the fundamental right of parents to raise our children without undue interference from federal and state governments and to oversee our children's education, and assert that the State does not have unlimited power to dictate one set of standards or regulate a certain way to educate our children. We therefore submit a list of grievances against the State Superintendent of Education, who's signaled his intention to force Christian and home schools under the control of the Alabama Department of Education and under the same courses of study as public schools, aka Common Core, which takes away an inherent right of parents to decide what our children should learn and how to teach it. We seek redress to these grievances by asking the State Board of Education and the Alabama Legislature to forfeit the Superintendent's actions and restore parental control and state sovereignty over education in Alabama.

To Sign the Petition (Full Petition is below) fill in form and click - Name, County, and Email are mandatory entries. - Sign Petition

Additional Information on Alabama Common Core

News Paper Article, State should abandon plans to charge and regulate church schools

The Alabama Department of Education has begun taking small but meaningful steps
toward encroaching on the right of church-based schools to operate free of government
oversight, and it should stop dead in its tracks.
At issue are long-standing exemptions for religious schools from some of the regulations and fees imposed on non-religious private schools. For instance, private schools are charged a $500 licensing fee that church-based schools aren't. However, a new rule would require the church schools to start paying the $500 fee, and other changes are afoot.

State officials outlined the proposals during a July meeting with representatives of several nonpublic schools. Attendees were told that the state wanted to create a "partnership," and the changes and fees were part of the process.
What the state misses is that parents like me who opt out of public schools have already decided against any sort of partnership with the state's public education system. Moreover, many of us choose church schools based on our faith.

On another front, homeschooling parents were alarmed to learn they could be impacted as well. This caught the attention of the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), an organization that I belong to that protects the rights of homeschooling parents.
"If this document were adopted and implemented, the State Department of Education would begin to regulate church schools for the first time in state history," wrote Dewitt T. Black, senior counsel at HSLDA, in an email alert to members. This affects homeschooling families because Alabama requires them to affiliate with a church school.
Black wrote that the HSLDA would fight the changes which he believes are an "overreach of government authority."http://www.al.com/opinion/index.ssf/2013/08/state_should_abandon_plans_to.html

Time for Action - Stop Government Control of Private Education

1. Senator Dick Brewbaker of Montgomery has introduced SB 38, to restrict Ala Dept of Education. Contact your local State Representative and State Senator
** Support the Senator Brewbaker bill, SB 38 to restrict Tommy Bice and the Alabama State School Board from regulating Christian Schools and Home Schools -
** Request the Legislature removed from Alabama from the Federal Common Core Program. Common Core intends to implement complete federal control of pubic and private education. Contact info for Legislature- Contact Alabama Legislature
2. Copy above Petition and send it to your local Republican County Executive Committee, and ask them to pass it as a Resolution.
Also send it to local tea party group or conservative group, and and ask them to support the cause.
3. Contact local Christian Schools, Home School groups, other conservative groups, and encourage them to get involved.
4. Forward this information to others

Regulation of private schools, now a major campaign issue

In special election of House District 74 of the Alabama Legislature, Oct 2013, It has become a major issue of the campaign:
Meadows said she vehemently opposes the Alabama Department of Educations recent attempt to regulate the state's private schools by requiring them to obtain a license.
Common sense says that the Department of Education should be more focused on improving the 70+ failing schools in the state than on private schools or home school families. Meadows said. Allowing the state superintendent to tax private schools will raise cost for private school parents. This erosion of freedom cannot be tolerated.
http://yellowhammernews.com/statepolitics/meadows-qualifies-in-hd74-hopes-to-succeed-jay-love

Newspaper Article:
Bill would Stop State Department of Education from licensure, regulation
of private schools

A summer controversy over the relationship of the Alabama State Department
of Education to private schools - and the exact relationship it wants -
could end if a bill prefiled by Sen. Dick Brewbaker, R-Montgomery, is
passed.
"If they can be governed through the administrative code, they have no
representation in front of that board," Brewbaker said in a recent
interview. "By regulation, the state board could more or less at will change
licensing requirements and get rid of schools."

Education officials said the new rules actually were aimed at minimizing and
clarifying ALSDE's role in public schools. In an Aug. 6 letter to private
schools, State Superintendent Tommy Bice said the proposed regulations were
intended to sweep away outdated regulations, including requirements that the
state superintendent approve tuition changes at private schools.
"We were attempting to forge a partnership with Alabama's private and church
schools and remove any vestiges of the outdated regulatory guidance and
remove several statutory areas of overreach, while at the same time provide
students and parents with protection and assurance of some comparability
between educational choices currently available to Alabama students," Bice
wrote in the letter.
The 2014 legislative session begins Jan. 14.
http://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/article/20131129/NEWS02/311290014/Bill-w
ould-remove-State-Department-Education-from-licensure-regulation-private-sch
ools